Can the Use of Bedside Lung Ultrasound Reduce Transmission Rates in The Case of The COVID-19 Patient? - A Narrative Review

Novel Corona Virus Disease-19 (nCov-19, COVID-19) was recognised as a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020. As of June 14, 2020, this contagious viral disease has afflicted 188 out of 195 countries in the world with 7,893,700 confirmed cases and 432,922 global deaths.Canada has 98,787 people infected and 8,146 deaths. COVID-19 is thought to transmit through contact, droplets and aerosolization. A rapid review showed limited information on the benefits of conducting lung ultrasound (LUS) versus chest radiograph (CXR) or studies correlating lung ultrasound to chest computed Tomography (CT) in patients positive for Covid-19. The literature review confirmed that CT and LUS cannot diagnose this disease, but that both can help in the management and staging of this disease. There is no literature to prove that LUS at the bedside may be beneficial from the view of decreased transmission to other health care workers and bystanders due to reduced transit but comparing the transit pathway and contact leads one to propose that this would be so. Pregnant patients with COVID-19, young children and patients in the reproductive stage would also benefit from LUS since there is no radiation dose and the critical patient in distress will benefit from testing at the bedside.